Our take on Breadsong’s fabulous Christmas Rose was to make it Green with basil pesto and Red with home made sun dried tomatoes. We used our combo yeast water, rye sour and Desem sourdough starters with our 30% whole gain multi-grain mix of Kamut, dark rye, spelt and whole wheat.

As has been the norm lately, we added some red and white malt, Toady Tom’s Toasted Tidbits (wheat bran, oat bran, wheat germ and other middlings from various sifted flours), oats, potato flakes and flax seeds all ground up together as a fancy and festive bread enhancement all purpose mix.

We had a little less than 900 g of dough compared to Breadsongs’s 1,200 g that she split in half and she only used half. We split this in half too, to make 2 ropes – one basil, almond, walnut, Parmesan and olive oil and the other sun dried tomato, oregano, salt, pepper and olive oil. We decided not to use any garlic and hoped we wouldn't miss it with all the other stuff in this bread’s fillings.

Each rope was split in half and combined with the other colored half and then braided to make (2) each red and green braids that were wrapped around each other to make a rose. The ropes were smaller so we ended up with a more shallow Frisbee like, Italian Flat Bread Rose, but it was still very fancy do and Christmas festive looking.

The SD and YW levains were built separately over 8 hours now that it is winter time and refrigerated overnight. The flours and all the other ingredients were mixed with the water and allowed to autolyse for 3 hours as the levains warmed up to room temperature the next day.

We made a little proofing pad with a heating pad on low covered with kitchen towels to get the temperature to hover right at 82 degrees. The levains were not built on it but they were warmed up on it and the dough was fermented, developed and proofed on it too. What a handy little contraption it turned out to be.

Once the levains hit the autolyse it was 12 minutes of French (2) slaps per fold in order to get this dough stretched, silky and smooth with a high degree of gluten development. Normally we would have easily been over 75% hydration for a dough like this but, with the olive oil coming in later for both fillings, we decided to hold the water at 73.5%.

After the French slap and folds were complete, we let the dough rest for 30 minutes and then 2 sets of S&F’s were done 30 minutes apart. The dough was rested for 20 minutes, divided in half, rolled out with a pin and the filling spread on before rolling up into a log.

Each log was split in half and then braided with the opposite colored half and then the two green and red braids were coiled up on parchment to make the rose.

The rose was allowed to ferment and develop on the proofing pad in a plastic bag for 1 ½ hours before being retarded overnight for 8 hours. After removal from the fridge in the morning it was allowed to final proof on the proofing pad for 4 hours where it doubled in volume.

We had some lemon infused olive oil, balsamic vinegar, cracked black pepper and Parmesan cheese to dip the bread into for lunch.

The mini oven was fired up to 425 F with steam in the bottom of the broiler pan. The bread was loaded and allowed to steam for 10 minutes before the steam was removed. The bread baked at 350 F, convection this time, until it hit 200 F in the middle. It was rotated 90 degrees every 5 minutes until it was done and removed to a cooling rack - about 30 minutes total baking time.

My daughter said this was the best tasting bread I have ever made but she, being away for college, only gets to sample about 10% of the bread baked around here. My wife wants to have it dipped in olive oil, with grated Parmesan, rosemary and black pepper for a Christmas dinner appetizer.

My apprentice just wants to eat all right now with butter and not have to share it with anyone including her master! I think that this is one of the best higher whole grain focaccias I have ever tasted. Just delicious. The mini oven put mini blisters on the crispy brown crust and the YW made the crumb moist and tender with that hint of SD that lingers with the herbs and tomato.

We were struggling with our normally robustmRye sour and Desem mixed SD starter. It had been left for dead after its last feeding and storage about a month ago. I had baked 4 loaves of bread from the 80 g stored and had 40 g left and it was looking the worse for wear.

We tried building a levain using 5 g and 1:10:10 but after 20 hours there was no visible change. The kitchen temperature was 65 F and we though the low temperature might be the problem. So, we added 5 more grams of starter, put it in a 78 F environment that the microwave provided with one of Sylvia's steaming cups.

Sure enough 6 hours later, the levain and finally nearly doubled. You for get how nice the AZ summers are for over proofing just about anything and everything. Now with winter temps of 65 F yeast just doesn’t like to be aroused and put to work.

We took the remaining 30 g of starter and fed it but kept it on the counter to double which it nearly did in 24 hours. We decided it and feed it again to get it back up to speed and saved the other half for some panettone bake possibly for Christmas but more likely for New Years.

We decided to use our revived starter to make a variation of one of our favorite breads; fig, pistachio, sunflower and pumpkin seed bread. But, we decided to try and bake it like you would pumpernickel - long, slow and low and see if the crust and crumb would turn a dark brown color like pumpernickel does baked this way.

The question was which way to do this; the Norm Berg way, the Andy way, the Mini Oven way or the Jeffrey Hamelman way - or some combination which could be a dangerous meeting of the ryes. My apprentice wanted to use our Wagner Ware Magnalite Turkey roaster since nothing puts a dark brown crust on bread like it does – nothing even close.

The trivet on the bottom allows extra water to be placed in the roaster so that it doesn’t touch the bread itself. We hoped that the steam in the roaster with an oval shaped chacon would substitute for the aluminum foil covered tins normally used for pumpernickel.

It was worth a shot and, if it wasn’t turning out right, my apprentice could always save the day, as she has taught herself to do in out kitchen, by taking the lid off and bake the bread to 205 F on the inside at a higher temperature – none the worse for wear - if you are like my apprentice and will eat anything.

The levain was build with one build over and agonizing 26 hours. Everything except the levain, barley malt syrup, figs, pistachios, seeds and salt were autolysed for 2 hours. Once the levain, barley malt syrup and salt were added to the autolyse, we did 10 minutes of French slap and folds which were nice to do at 75% hydration.

The dough was rested 20 minutes in an oiled, plastic covered bowl when 3 sets of S& F’s were done on 20 minute intervals. The figs, pistachios and seeds were added in during the 2nd set of S& F’s. Half the seeds were held back for a ringed topping around the knotted roll.

Inside at the crack of dawn you can see the holes in the crumb better. Haven't had lunch with it yet but the sunset was nice.

Once the S&F’s were complete, the dough was allowed to ferment and develop on the counter for 1 hour before being shaped into a single knot chacon and placed in a rice floured basket. The basket was placed in a nearly new trash can liner and allowed to develop for another hour before being retarded in the fridge overnight for 8 hours.

The next morning the dough basket was retrieved from the fridge and allowed to come to room temperature and final proof for 4 hours when it had doubled. Now came the time to decide which way to bake it – what turned out to be a difficult decision.

After much thought, careful deliberation with my apprentice and talking to rye experts worldwide we decided that Mini Oven’s way of baking it was the way to go. Baking in the specialized turkey roaster at 320 F until it registered 205 F on the inside was the simplest most efficient way to go in order to have the oven empty by 2 PM when the girls needed it to bake Christmas cookies.

After a half and hour the bread has spread out rather than up probably due to the low temperature but it was a slightly darker color. We put it back in the oven for another 50 minutes at 320 F. When we checked the temp was at 203 F and the color was still pale.

So we cranked up the oven to 425 F, convection this time and took the bread out of the turkey roaster and baked it directly on the oven rack for 15 more minutes. At that time it registered 205 F and it was a blistered weird brown color not usually associated with this kind of bread. So off went the oven and we let the bread crisp on the oven rack with the door ajar for 10 minutes.

This has to be the strangest and longest way to make a Frisbee that my apprentice has ever managed. Thank goodness she is a professional! Can’t wait to see what it looks like on the inside. Hopefully it will be a darker brown color than it would otherwise be and taste way better too - or this bake will go down as total and complete apprentice failure, if well meaning.

The bread, while flat, had a nice open crumb for so much stuff in it. The crumb was much darker than normal and it was moist and soft. The taste was enhanced like a light caramelization on anything will do. I was really shocked how deep the flavor was and how nice this bread tasted - toasted it was outstanding. Can't wait to try some pate on it. When we do this again, we will start the bread baking at 450 F for 20 minutes so it wouldn't spread out and spring instead. Then turn the oven down to 230 F like Andy does for his pumpernickel and get in the low portion of the bake until 205 F registered on the inside.

You learn from each bake, like we did this time, so this one was not a total loss - and the bread that came out of it was quite unlike any we managed to bake to date.

Continuing on with her Puff Paste adventure, my apprentice decided to do a take off on rugelach. Rugelach has cream cheese in the dough and are just fantastic with any filling imaginable. If you aren't making them for the Holidays then the Holidays where will be slightly less festive than they should be ;-)

While we love rugelach,we much prefer the ones my apprentice makes with puff pastry - by far! They are so light and just plain overkill in a really decadent, if sinful, way.

We were trying out a new filling that has cocoa, brown and white sugar, chopped chocolate chips and chopped Heath Chocolate Toffee Bits. Yummy!

Rugelach are supposed be rolled out as a circle before cutting them into triangle shapes with a pizza cutter. We had square shapes of puff paste left over from our square snowflake experiment yesterday. No worries! Just roll them out thinner, say a little less than 1/8", brush them with melted butter, sprinkle in he filling, cut them into 8 pie shaped pieces and roll them up, croissant like. from the large end to the point.

Brush them with an egg wash and sprinkle on some Turbinado sugar. Bake at 400 F convection for 6 minutes, then turn the pan 180 degrees and bake for another 5 minutes or so until golden brown and puffed. These weighed between 8 and 12 grams each after baking and were just as tasty as tasty could be for one bite.

Now that the AZ weather has turned off the 6 month oven time bake, we can get back into puff pastry and other laminated dough like croissants – Yeaah!!

I took some paper and cut squares with scissors until I got a shape I liked. You fold the square corner to corner first. Then you make 4 cuts from the long folded edge toward the opposite point but don’t cut all the way.

Open the square back up. You put your filling down the uncut middle from end to end. Mine was chocolate chips dark brown sugar and cocoa. Then fold the inside square corners up to a triangle pointing skyward.

The take the inner most cut pieces and fold them over themselves to the opposite side.

Then fold the outermost cut pieces over themselves to the opposite side just like the inside ones. This encapsulates the filling and after some egg glaze and turbinado sugar makes a weird puff paste shape like this.

I sprinkled turbinado sugar on mine.

I baked this one at 400 F in the mini oven until it was nice and golden.

The last two bakes were a lower and then a higher percentage of whole grains and more complex that this one at 48% whole grains. We also used the KA mixer on speed 3 to knead the dough for 8 minutes instead of using French slap and folds and we baked the bread in a DO instead of on a stone with steam.

The rye sour and YW combo levain consisted of dark whole rye and water that was built over 10 hours with (2) 1 hour stages and one of 8 hours. After the levain had doubled we refrigerated it for 12 hours and then let it come to room temperature the next day for 2 hours as we autolysed the flours.

The AP, spelt, whole wheat, rye, potato flakes, oat flour ground flax seeds, baked potato, malts and Toady Tom’s Toasted Tidbits were autolysed with the Baltika #6 Porter and home made red wine vinegar for 2 hours before combining with the salt and the levain in the KA for kneading.

The dough was rested for 20 minutes and then 4 sets of S&F’s were done on 20 minute intervals. The caraway and coriander seeds along with a new ingredient; caraway leaves and roasted re=hydrated onions were incorporated on the 3rd set.

The rye, spelt and ww sprout chits were incorporated on the 4th set. Don’t forget to start your ww sprouts 48 hours ahead and the rye and spelt seeds 24 hours ahead to make sure they all chit together and are ready when needed. Also take the 1 T of dried onions and roast them for a couple of minutes at 350 F to get them dark, not burned like I did the first time, and then re-hydrate them in 3 T of water 4 hours ahead of time.

After the 4th set of S&f’S the dough was allowed to develop and ferment for 1 hour before being pre shaped and shaped into a boule and placed into a rice floured basket inside a trash can liner where it was allowed to ferment for another hour before being retarded for 8 hours in the fridge.

The dough was then allowed to come to room temperature and ferment and develop some more on the counter the next day for 6 hours since the temperature in the kitchen is only 67 F.

The oven was preheated to 450 F. The basket was upended into the cold DO, poorly scored (can’t seem to ever do it right in a DO), and placed into the hot oven that was immediately turned down to 425 F where the bread steamed itself for 25minutes. Then the lid was removed and the bread baked for another 20 minutes.

10 minutes after the lid came off the bread was removed from the DO and continued to bake directly on the oven rack. The bread was also rotated 180 degrees every 5 minutes until it reached 205 F on the inside. The bread was allowed to crisp on the oven rack for 10 minutes with the oven off and door ajar before being moved to the cooling rack. It sure smells tasty.

The crumb came out open and moist with a great chew due to the sprouts. The taste was very good. Instead of the dominate onion taste like last time, we had a caraway flavor that came through due to the caraway leaves and not the caraway seeds. This is what Americans would call rye bread even though rye only makes up about 27% of the flours used in the bread. We really like the way this bread tastes. It is complex and earthy. The combination of whole rye being twice as much as whole spelt and WW and the whole grains making up 50% of the flours is one we like very much. The YW and SD levain combination also helps to lighten the crumb and open it up thanks to the YW while still getting a SD taste to come through too.

This time we upped the whole grains to 75% and the hydration to a little over 85%. We dropped the chops and added multi-grain sprouts. The whole grains and sprouts were rye, spelt and whole wheat. A combination we like very much as long as the rye equals the other two grains.

We also decided to make this bread a little more Russian by using their Baltika #6 Porter for a majority of the liquid in this bread and all of the dough wetness if you overlook the barley malt.

We were overcome by guilt and also knowing that The Hempster would not be her kindly self if we left out the seeds so we tossed in some caraway and coriander to perfume this dark bread in a traditional way - but not too much.

Hanseata, probably in a fit of non-hempness, is also the creator of her very fine wild rice bread that we like so much. Thinking she would still be upset that there are no hemp seeds in this bread, we plunked in some cooked wild rice hoping to appease Her Hempness with one last gesture of jester.

Keeping with the black theme this bread was calling out for, we also added in some caramelized onions, quite a lot actually, with its deglazed reduced juices as Eric, Andy, Ian and so many TFL bakers are wont to do out ofa honed professional education and experience for many of them that know what they are doing and a playful, inquisitive wonderment of the strange for Ian and myself.

One last shot at anti-establishment went to the Combo YW and SD rye and Desem starter and levain we cooked up over two builds. As we contemplated the dark path we were about to trip along, in total disregard of anything sane or normal, my apprentice became edgy, quite uncomfortable really and took on the look of one sick puppy. No, it wasn’t Toady Tom’s Toasted Tidbits at fault here even though we put 15 g of them in the mix.

It is a look that I see most often right before she upchucks - which she did... then murmuring under her lowly growl something about death to all dark baking masters or another…….. It seemed she got sick after noticing that the bread lacked nuts. She recovered quickly after the upheaval when she realized there were already plenty of nuts out of their shells in the kitchen as it was - so no extra nuts were required for this Holiday bake.

After all of what would pass for bread 101 on Empress Ying’s home planet, we hoped that this bread would be a shade darker than a dark one should be and also one that we could be proud to pair with the fine Pate Maison that we had baked and smoked up for the Holidays the day before. Hopefully, both will pair well with a nice Malbec from Argentina, if one could afford it and a plate of various exotic cheeses from other places even more expensive.

Hey, it’s the Holidays and who needs another pair of Santa socks, snowflake ties and Snowman stocking caps anyway. So, as an option, save enough bread by not getting those things and splurge on some foreign hooch and cheese to share with family and friends instead - all while making the bread and pate that much better.

The crust came out dark, shiny and crispy but, after a 24 hour wait before slicing, it went soft with a slight chew. This bread cut ¼” slices easily without crumbling. The crumb was not heavy, slightly open, soft and very moist with little gloss.

The taste was where this bread really shines. Subtle coriander and caraway flavors combine with a stronger caramelized onion taste and the chew of the wild rice and sprouts to go with the complex flavors of the porter, cocoa and coffee. Very tasty indeed.

We have now eaten it plain, toasted with butter, as a sandwich and toasted with pate – just delicious and the perfect pate platter mate.

Method

The method was straight forward if you remember to start the WW sprouts a day before the spelt and rye sprouts since they take 48 hours to chit instead of 24. The levain was built over (2) stages of 8 and 4 hours each with an overnight retard of 12 hours following the 12 hours on the counter

The flours, salt, Toady Tom’s Toasted Tidbits, ground flax seed and the red and white malts were autolysed with the Baltika #6 Porter for 1 hour after my apprentice had tasted about 205 ml of the 500 ml bottle to make sure that it wasn’t a covert left over cold war poison of a 3rd kind.

Once the autolyse and levain came together, we did 10 minutes of French slap and folds and then 3 sets of S&F’s on 30 minute intervals where the seeds and rice were incorporated in the 2nd set and the sprouts on the 3rd set.

The dough was allowed to ferment and develop for 1 hour before being shaped into an 800 g and one near 500 g loaf and panned. The dough was allowed to proof for 1 hour in a trash bag on the counter before being retarded for 12 hours in the fridge.

Once out of the fridge the small loaf was allowed to proof for 4 hours on the counter. The larger one proofed for 4 hours on the counter at 65 - 68 F and an additional 1 ½ hours at 85 F in the make shift microwave proofer that had a cup of boiling water in it.

Both of these should have been baked in the mini oven but Big Betsy was preheated to 500 F instead with 2 of Sylvia’s steaming pans and a 12”cast iron skillet full of lava rocks on the bottom rack. The stone was put on the very top rack of the oven to project radiant heat downward to the top of the loaves.

As soon as the small pan went in the temperature was turned down to 450 F for 15 minutes of steam. When the steam was removed the temperature was turned down to 350 F, convection this time.

After 5 minutes the bread was removed from the pan and finished baking directly on the oven rack. The bread was turned 180 degrees every 5 minutes until the internal temperature reached 190 F. Total baking was 30 minutes when the bread was removed to the cooling rack.

The larger loaf was baked the same way through steam but took an extra 15 minutes at 350 F to reach 190 F internal temperature.

This chacon is a tribute to Eric Hanner. His gifts to the world were many and his passion for balking was great. His fine character attributes included his generosity that made him willing to help and teach others what he knew. Eric’s legacies are many and this bake commemorates them. He was a giant and this chacon is especially large to recognize his largess.

The white portion of the dough is a 6 strand zolablue SD Challah that we converted to a poolish from SD. The 4 braided ends were not tucked in to give the chacon more of chance to crack making a pretty design on the top.

The dark portion is Eric’s Favorite SD Rye – his Jewish Deli Rye was used as a monster bialy to cover the braids of the challah in the bottom of the basket. This is the largest bialy we have ever attempted and flipping it over was sight to be seen.

The 5 recipe changes I made to Eric's Favorite were minor ones. First one was to use 95 g of the challah poolish in place of yeast in Eric’s dough. We only had 2.5 g of caraway so I added a like amount of coriander. We added 1 g each of red and white rye malts to improve enzymatic action, the rye flavor and color – while Eric wasn't looking.

My apprentice used caramelized onions and the water from it and the deglazed pan instead of re-hydrating minced onions as Eric recommended. The flavor and color of caramelized onion should make this as exciting as Eric wrote about using onion and the water from it in this bread. He wanted everyone to give this option a go!

I also didn’t have any first clear flour and have never seen any, so we tried to replicate it using David Snyder’s ideas on how to do so from another thread by using some WW mixed with AP and bread flour. We don’t know what it should look like but David’s advice is usually spot on. I don’t think Eric would have minded theses changes.

Method changes included using French slap and folds for both of the breads - for about 12 minutes. Eric’s Favorite Rye was a two slaps and one fold process since the dough was so stiff and required the extra slap to stretch it out enough to fold over. Eric was the one who got me doing French slap and folds and my breads have been greatly improved as a result.

2 sets of (4) S&Fs were also performed on 30 minute intervals for the first hour of development and then the dough was rested for an hour. After shaping and putting the dough in the rice floured basket ,we let it proof for an hour before putting it into the fridge for a 15 hour retard.

This is not part of Eric’s method but we just ran out of time to bake it off and this was the best we could manage. We fired up Old Betsy to preheat at 450 F with 2 of Sylvia’s steaming pans and a 12” iron skillet with lava rocks inside like David Snyder sort of uses- while the dough warmed upon the counter for 40 minutes. This is huge lump of dough, 3.8 pounds of it and it need lots of steam.

Once the dough went in and we threw a half a cup of water on the lava rocks as we shut the door and turned the temperature down to 370 F. We decided to steam for 20 minutes instead of 10. At the 10 minute mark the cracks had barely opened on the huge loaf and more steam was needed.

At the 20 minute mark, the steam was removed and the bread continued to bake at 370 F, convection this time, for an additional 26 minutes rotating it 70 degrees every 7 minutes until it registered 190 F in the center. We left it on the stone for another 10 minutes with oven off and door ajar to crisp the skin before removing it to a cooling rack.

It browned up a dark mahogany color that was so nice I decided not to coat it with the corn starch and water mix. Even the challah portion was the same color. It blistered very well on the challah portion but not on the rye side for some reason?

It bloomed while cracking beautifully and at least looks the fitting tribute to Eric that we had hoped to achieve - at least on the outside. Well, coundn't wait 24 hours to cut into it since showed promise and smelled tantalizing. The crumb was soft nice and moist and medium open especially on the rye side.

The taste would be straight Jekyll if there wasn't a Hyde Side. One bite is a fine Jewish Rye with subtle caraway and coriander hints, the next a straight Shabot Challah and then comes a half and half combo bite.

Here are the formulas should you want to make a Chacon for Eric. I sure enjoyed doing so and we learned much from this baking experience. It was great time to reflect, day dream a little and think about the past, present and future.

The sunset was very niuce the day we baked this bread. I think someone really important knew a nice one for Eric was in order.

My Daughter’s summer kitchen apprenticeship with my other apprentice seems to have stuck. She recently made Thai Green Curry Chicken for her boyfriend, - from memory and she quickly impressed Ole Dad with her remembering how to do French slap and folds and stretch and folds on her Thanksgiving rolls that she is always in charge of making for dinner.

She also is in charge of the gravy since she is the Gravy Queen and this year’s was the best yet and she decided to not put a splash of cognac in to start the de-glazing – no wine either! Who knew gravy could be so good without either?

Look at those yellow specks from Toady Tom's Toasted Tidbits !

We made up this recipe as we went along. After we scraped the small polish plastic tub down thoroughly to make the last bread for the stuffing, we put some more flour and water in the tub hoping the leftovers would be enough to start a new batch of polish. 24 hours of counter fermenting later, it was bubbling and ready to go.

We decided to make 8 rolls of 100 g each and wanted the polish to be 15% of the final dough. We used 5 g of Toady Tom’s, Tasty, Toasted Tidbits for some extra flavor and brown speckles, 25 g of WWW flour, 25 g of butter, 2% salt and 72.2% hydration.

The final exam Bakers percentage test question was: If the butter was 20% water and using equal parts of cream and water for the liquid, how much AP and Bread flour were required if the AP flour was 3 times as much ad the bread flour and how much cream and water were used?

Yep the mini put some blisters on these rolls.

We hear that professional bread baking instructors use questions like this for their students even though they aren't allowed to beat them for answering incorrectly like the old days and private instructor’s still can today….. The trick follow up question was, if we would have remembered to put milk in for the water portion of the liquid, added 10g of potato flakes, 1 egg and 10g of honey in to make them more soft roll like, instead of french bread like, how many grams of extra milk or flour would you have to add to keep the hydration the same?

Very nice french bread but not really the soft rolls we usually enjoy. Great with butter and jam though . My wife said they would make fine croutons or bread crumbs and my daughter said she is making biscuits next holiday in a month or so :-)

Daughter's French slap and fold tutorial....hard to believe it became that beautiful dough ball.

We didn't have time for an autolyse because the turkey, that my furrier apprentice was in charge of, was going to be done in 5 hours - so time was as short as her legs. After mixing everything together, my daughter got right into a good rhythm of French slap and folds for 10 minutes.

Next thing you know the dough was resting in a plastic covered bowl for 30 minutes before a set of S&F’s were done and it was back in the bowl for 1 1/2 hours of fermenting after once again impressing with her boule shaping and skin tightening techniques.

The dough was divided into 8 pieces. 6 of the dough balls were divided again into two pieces. The remaining 2 large 100g pieces were folded and then free formed into rolls on parchment and the other, smaller pieces were used to make 6 rolls in a muffin tin - 2 to a tin opening. Then they were to proof for a couple of hours and be ready to bake.

Sadly, the increasingly de-focused appearing apprentice somehow managed to get the really big chicken done 1 1/2 hours early. This was probably through faulty calculations that did not require the actual calculus poorly used - if not totally incorrectly applied.

The other college educated apprentice’s fine rolls were no where near proofed and would not be ready for the mini oven’s blistering heat until after the Thanksgiving dinner dishes were done.

They were eventually baked at 350 F in the mini oven for 8 minutes with steam and the baked for another 15 minutes at 350 F, convection this time. We rotated the rolls every 5 minutes to make sure that they baked up evenly brown. They sure puffed themselves up well once they hit the steam

Thankfully, we have Thanksgiving Dinner all over again the next day, usually a Friday for some reason, as a bizarre, if totally fulfilling, as well as, filling, tradition started by my Great, Great, Great, Granny C now deceased neigh on 150 years.

The Ozark Mountains have never been the same since Granny C died and was buried at Dooley’s but Uncle Jed, Ellie Mea and Jethro were all better for her lording over and caring for them and the rest of us wouldn't even be here without her either. So the rolls will be half polished off tonight in the Thanksgiving Dinner After.

When I went to freeze half the rolls last night, I noticed that 1 was missing and it is hard to freeze half of 7 without making a mess of one of them. I suspected the badly calculating, if cute, apprentice managed to sneak a taste of the missing when I saw her licking her chops and sticking her tongue out at me in her ‘that was delicious’ grin.

So we won’t be able to take a look at the inside or have a taste till later tonight but I’m guessing they are pretty good from the look on Lucy’s face.

It has been over a week with the stollen being wrapped in cotton and sealed in its tin coffin where the back porch would be if we had one. Instead we have a covered patio. So we took it out, leaving its sister to ripen until the next Holiday and decided to gussie it up some to be traditional - a non traditional Brownman trait. Here it is naked but looking like a million dollars on a pretty 50 cent Goodwill Stollen Plate.

Then we buttered it up with a pastry brush.

Then, taking a cue from a fine Fresh Lofian Baker suggestion, gmabaking, we decided to make a lemon juice and powdered sugar glaze to sprinkle off a spoon for decoration.

Then to get back to the traditional stollen page we dusted it with some powered sugar to make it look like the first time it has ever snowed at the Brownman AZ abode.

Then it was time to slice it open and see if it was as festive on the inside as the outside.

The snow was melting fast in the hot AZ desert but is sure was purdy on the inside.

It tasted wonderful and a grateful shout out goes to nellapower for her original Dresden Stollen recipe that was used as the basis for this version of Not So Stollen. The citrus peel, pistachio nuts and snockered fruits really come through. The lemon /sugar drizzle was especially nice too thanks to gmabaking. Not at all as heavy as a fine English fruit cake or a German one like my apprentice. Can't wait to see what the sister will look and taste like in about another 4 weeks or so.

Served with some cold French Silk ice cream and a little chocolate sauce.

Can being sealed in a tin and subject to the 40 F to 75 F daily AZ temperature fluctuations really be good for Not So Stollens?

Here is a link to the original Not So Sollen post if yu want the recipe and methods:

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